Millenium Bridge Opens

On June 10, 2000, the Millenium Bridge - a footbridge across the River
Thames - was opened by Queen Elizabeth. The radical new design was the work of
architect Sir Norman Foster with sculptor Sir Anthony Caro and engineering
support from Arup. It was the first new crossing of the River Thames in over 100
years. As the first few thousand people crossed the bridge, it developed an
unexpected and potentially dangerous lateral "wobble". This caused people to
unwittingly walk "in step", which increased the oscillation. The design had been
adapted from a computer model typical for a car bridge, but which did not take
into account the lateral forces associated with human walking. After structural
damping was added to stop the oscillation, the bridge re-opened in 2002.